Heat exchanger tower structures are in wide use in industry. Among the many types of heat exchanger towers, also often referred to as cooling towers, are towers that utilize tube bundle panels which are flat panels comprising a number of parallel running tubes. The tubes may in some cases have fins to assist with heat exchange. These structures are used, for example, to condense steam or to cool warm fluid such as process fluid from an industrial process. In the case of use to condense steam, they are often referred to as air cooled condensers. The warm fluid or steam, often from an industrial process, is supplied to the panels and flows through the tubes in the panels and is cooled by the tube bundle panels being in contact with ambient air. The condensate or cooled fluid is recovered from the panels and can be re-supplied to the industrial process.
In one type of heat exchanger tower structure, one or more tube bundle panels are oriented vertically and form one or more sides of a geometric tower structure, often referred to as a cell or module. The module may be square or rectangular in plan view, for example, or may be hexagonal in plan view. Often a plurality of such geometric tower structures are placed next to each other in rows, thus forming a combined tower facility that has a plurality of individual modules or cells. In some or all cases, the tube panels may be angled also relative to vertical. The tube bundle panels can be quite large and heavy, and a support structure is needed to support the tube panel bundles in their vertical positions, along with structure to support an outlet fan which may be located at the top of the cell. Other components of a module also need to be supported. Heretofore, this supporting structure has often been an on-site constructed frame structure in keeping with known cooling tower building procedures. However, it is always desirable to reduce the costs of labor and materials involved in erecting and operating such a structure. It is also desirable to develop one or more relatively standardized module configurations that can be erected and used quickly and easily.